January 2018

CEL-SCI awarded patent for RA vaccine

CEL-SCI Corporation, Vienna, VA, has received a patent from the European Patent Office for its LEAPS platform technology, which is being developed as a potential therapeutic vaccine for rheumatoid arthritis (RA). The patent, EP 2254588B1, is titled “Method of Preparation and Composition of Peptide Constructs for Treatment of Rheumatoid Arthritis.”

CEL-SCI’s LEAPS technology relates to peptide constructs that may be useful in the treatment or prevention of autoimmune diseases, particularly RA, asthma, allergies, and graft-versus-host rejection. Upon completion of preclinical investigational new drug (IND) enabling studies for the LEAPS-based RA vaccine candidate, CEL-SCI intends to file an IND application with the US Food and Drug Administration to allow the vaccine to be tested in humans to determine its safety and potential therapeutic usefulness. In animal challenge tests, LEAPS platform technology has been shown to direct the immune response preferentially to a cellular (eg, T-cell), humoral (antibody) or mixed pathway.